The Buyer | What Côtes du Rhône Guilty Pleasures are you getting up to?

Here’s how Côtes du Rhône is working with leading restaurants and bars to take its wines to more customers in a way that is hopefully meaningful and memorable.

What are the guilty pleasures you enjoy to spark up your life? Listening to Abba doing the weekly shop? Popping into the drive thru on the commute home? Well, for Côtes du Rhône’s new on-trade marketing campaign, Guilty Pleasures, it’s all about finding ways to transform simple pleasures of everyday life into special, moments thanks to wine. And ideally Côtes du Rhône wine.

It hopes its new Guilty Pleasures campaign, which has been running throughout October, will help tap into our collective desire to experience something new and different on a night out. The campaign has looked to mix above the line activity, with its own dedicated website, social media activity and advertising in consumer press. This includes a link-up with Foodism magazine, and a series of radio interviews with wine writer, Matt WallsA. All together the campaign claims it is on course to reach over 5 million consumers and wine trade professionals.

It’s all about combining Côtes du Rhône’s Everyday Sophistication message for its wines in ways that connect with the average wine drinker by promoting wines that are meant for everyday drinking.

This is the latest activity as part of an on-going Côtes du Rhône campaign to bring its wines to everyday drinkers like these posters that ran in the London tube

The consumer campaign also includes the chance to win an evening at Frenchie in Covent Garden, worth £500, by simply sharing a photo on social media of either a Côtes du Rhône or Côtes du Rhône Villages wine.

That’s Entertainment…

Which has seen it team up with a number of outlets to provide them a range of materials so that they can host their own tastings, dinners and events. All of which help demonstrate that these are the kinds of wines you can enjoy on different occasions with friends and family, whether they like red, rosé or white wines. Quality wines that are affordable, and won’t break the bank.

It is also an opportunity for those restaurants and bars to show the large variety of wines in the Côtes du Rhône in terms of styles, complexity, flavours and aromas. Wines that have the benefit of coming from an AOC classification and a heritage that goes back some 2,000 years. Again demonstrating that these are wines made by everyday growers and producers who love their own individual terroir and want to make wine to share with others.

To help get things going the Côtes du Rhône generic body is providing restaurants with £500 to help organise their own tailored event, including dedicated POS, and where necessary it can also provide on-site staff training by wine expert Emily Harman at VinaLupa.

To take part each restaurant has agreed to run a promotion or event in October that includes a minimum of Côtes du Rhône or Côtes du Rhône’s Villages wines from three suppliers, which might include a temporary listing during the activity. Crus wines are not included in the campaign (so no Beaumes-de-Venise, Cairanne, Condrieu, Cornas, Cote-Rotie, Crozes-Hermitage, Gigondas, Hermitage, Lirac, Muscat Beaumes-de-Venise, Rasteau, Saint-Joseph, Saint-Peray, Tavel, Vacqueyras, VDN Rastau, Vinsobres).

To be in a chance of winning the participating restaurants and bars will all need to submit a final marketing report on what activity they did, how many people were involved and what impact it had on their bottom line sales.

The restaurants taking part in the campaign include: